Community Poll Analysis: Week of April 10

[Ariwyn-WHA]

Today’s weekly analysis looks at April 10’s poll about CSR Satisfaction. This was definitely an interesting poll, and I’m VERY excited to be writing about it! This week’s question was: “How satisfied are you with WAR’s Customer Service System?” Possible answers were: “Extremely Satisfied,” “Somewhat Satisfied,” “Neutral/Not Sure,” “Somewhat Dissatisfied,” and “Extremely Dissatisfied.” This rapidly become one of our most popular polls, with 733 votes on Warhammer Alliance (WA) and 183 on Warhammer Vault (Vault).

This was an extremely telling poll. On WA the most popular answer with 240 votes was “Extremely Dissatisfied,” followed by “Somewhat Dissatisfied” (175 votes), “Neutral” (157 votes), “Somewhat Satisfied (106 votes), and “Extremely Satisfied” (55 votes).

Vault’s voting follows the same exact pattern, with “Extremely Dissatisfied” at the top with 67 votes and “Dissatisfied” (45 votes), “Neutral” (36 votes), “Somewhat Satisfied” (28 votes), and “Extremely Satisfied” (7 votes) trailing behind. It is interesting to note that, although Vault had less votes, they had a greater percentage of dissatisfaction.

Well, that doesn’t bode well, now does it?

Admittedly, a flaw with this poll is that we didn’t separate US/EU and, if we did, we couldn’t be sure if people from the right origins were voting. I’m curious to see that if we compiled data from each player base, how would the results stack up against each other? Would the US subscribers feel any differently than the EU subscribers?

Those who commented in our polling thread were generally appalled at the Customer Service. I took an approximate count, and by looking at server choice and reading posts, I’ve determined approximately 56 posts were from EU customers and 25 posts were from US (with a couple of posts from staff which didn’t count as either). That makes me stop and think, “Why?” Is the EU base more vocal than the US? Is it because more people from the EU continue to use WA? Or is it that there’s a huge glaring disparity between the CSR service from the US to the EU? Out of those 56 EU comments, I believe I saw TWO looking favorably at GOA. If that doesn’t speak volumes, I don’t know what does.

Another interesting tidbit is that I didn’t really see anyone comment about the wildcard system. I saw many posts like Zetruz’s from Karak Norn who said,

Extremely dissatisfied, mainly because Mythic says the deal is off with GOA if GOA's support isn't as good as Mythic's. Yet we Europeans have suffered pretty badly several times, and still Mythic won't do anything about it.

But are these players bearing in mind the fact that they have a wildcard system that US subscribers don’t? For those of you who don’t know, the wildcard system is something GOA has implemented for EU users. Essentially you get 3 wildcards a year that can be used to rectify player mistakes that wouldn’t normally be corrected, such as incorrect server transfers, buying an item by mistake, selecting the wrong influence reward, winning an item from need/greed by mistake, and forgetting to transfer a guild when you transfer a character. The wildcard system is great in theory but has a glaring problem: If they can do these things for users three times a year, why can’t they do them on a regular basis? For example, let’s say a person transfers to the wrong server by mistake—why can’t that be something that be fixed on a regular basis? Some things make sense, like if you buy an extra item, then you’re out of luck, but other things really have no excuse. Another thing to think about: If EU has it, why doesn’t the US? What does that say about Mythic’s handling of CSR service?

Leonhart of Karak-Azgal also brought up a great point:

Extremely Satisfied

(Almost) all my appeals have concluded within a reasonable time period.

My expectations of what a CSR can and cannot do are well grounded in reality.

Are we expecting too much from our CSR’s? Are we expecting miracles? If Mythic and GOA clearly outlined CSR’s abilities, perhaps the satisfaction level wouldn’t be so low. I, for one, have limited knowledge of what a CSR can and can’t do. On one hand, I may be expecting more than I should, but on the other hand, perhaps they actually aren’t adequately responding to the issues at hand.

I could sit here all day talking about this one poll, but what do you guys think? What do you think about EU service compared to US’s and things like the wildcard system? Don’t forget to vote in this week’s poll, which is about the upcoming Tomb Kings event, and make sure to comment because you might end up in the next weekly analysis!

[zetruz]

While it's true we have a Wildcard system, I have no idea how to use it. It should be glaringly obvious to allow for casual players to understand it - like a big button saying "I WANNA USE ME WILDCARD!" - but it isn't. So while the idea may be good, it's really hard (for me at least) to get it to work.

Might add that I helped taking Reikwald yesterday on Karak-Norn, and won a Gold Bag. Due to lag, I couldn't get to the chest before time ran out. Naturally, I reported it so I could get my bag back, but oh no - they said they've stopped giving gold bags back to players who failed to get them. The obvious solution to this problem is to remove the chest and just give you the bag automatally if you win, but it's too late for my gold bag.

Edit: Also, yay, you said my name. I matter!

[Meridion]

These polls are extremely susceptible to people's perceptions and are very skewed by our large trolling gloom and doom public. People who understand CS and gaming should know what CSRs can and cannot do. They are not game gods that can grant you fairy wings on your Shaman. I don't know about you, but when I went to school I wasn't given a respec once a year that let me totally change my major.



I see people laying down the old, " The customer is always right" . The customer is rarely right and are more often than not either short sighted so that they cannot understand the essence of a product or service. As if a game could be balanced based on the broken perceptions of the players who want to be something their class isn't.


In closing these polls are worthless when there is not a clearly laid out term which has a consolidated meaning to the idea of customer service. Maybe it would help if Mythic had a grab bag dedicated to what their Customer Service CAN and CANNOT do and what realistically grounded expectations of CS should be.

[Ariwyn-WHA]

It seems like, to use your wildcard, you simply state that you want to use it with the pertinent information in your appeal. Information needed can be found in the EU knowledge database at this link. There are other relevant articles at the bottom of the post. I know it may not solve all your issues, but I hope it helps!

[Ariwyn-WHA]

Originally Posted by Meridion

(snip) In closing these polls are worthless when there is not a clearly laid out term which has a consolidated meaning to the idea of customer service. Maybe it would help if Mythic had a grab bag dedicated to what their Customer Service CAN and CANNOT do and what realistically grounded expectations of CS should be.

I totally agree and actually called for it in my analysis. For example, a lot of people have issues with naming and forced server transfers. When their characters get transferred, their names get altered to prevent duplicates. While I understand the desire to change your name (which I think should be allowed), some people discover their name is taken by a level one and demand that they should have their name back. Obviously CSRs won't delete someone else's name just because you're level 40--it could start naming chaos and it wouldn't be fair to anyone involved. If we had clear guidelines of that CSRs could and could not do, and then retook the poll, I bet we would have VERY different results.

Thanks for your comment!

[Dana]

It seems like, to use your wildcard, you simply state that you want to use it with the pertinent information in your appeal.

But the point is, we dont know what we can use wildcards for and what dont, and neither do GOA csrs. Example.

Recently I resubed WAR and I wanted to play some other characters I deleted (I have 1 character at a time policy, means when I got bored with it, I delete it and make another. But its not the place for debate whether its stupid or not). So I was happy when Wildcards was announced, I thought I can recover my deleted chars. And so I did, I made appeal that I want to use Wildcard to recover my character blablabla. K, CSR came, saids its ok and it will be recovered. And it did, cool I think. But, since I wanted to check how other classes fare after 1.2. And I recovered 2 more characters the same way, without any problem.

After a while of playing, I realised I had 2 more characters I would like to play. But dang, Ive used my 3 wildcards already. Well I decided to try anyway, so Ive made a ticked about character recovery, but I didnt mentioned anything about the wildcards. Well guess what, it worked. So I tried to recover another one, and it worked this time too, althought this time, I got informed that "you have reached your restoration limit for the time being".

Now Im clueless, did I used my Wildcards needlessly because there was some "hard cap" on char restorations anyway ?
When I asked CSR for a detailed list of what you can, and what cant "do" using Wildcard, he replied he cant provide me that information. Now wheres logic in that ?

End of the story.

[Raine]

See the normal problem the people I deal with on PT have is getting screwed out of items via whatever way.

Now the CSR statement is: "If you have not had it in your inventory, we cannot do anything". Which is reasonable, it allows the player to understand the limitations of a CSR's powers.

When rollbacks happen. (happened 3-4 times on PT to masses of people) we lost crests and medallions. Crests&Medallions that were IN our inventory, yet we dont get those back either. (I have had my petition closed multiple times with zero comment or statement in my e-mail or while I was online.)

A guildie accidentally Salvaged one of his ward chest pieces, and petitioned a CSR to have it returned in place of the shard he recieved (which he kept). The CSR then wormed his way out of the situation and closed the ticket.

There are always some weird differing statements that end up really confusing people and that is why people are unsatisfied with the current CSR's.

I personally got screwed over by a CSR due to a name change. Got forced off line and sent to chapter 1 while doing Gunbad dungeons. I was told I would be able to choose my new name, but was given a small list of retardedly horrible names to choose from. I then had to send e-mails for 2 months to get the name changed to something I still didn't really like.

[Thason]

The thing is, you get varied responses from the Csr's. One day I asked for a csr to return an item I accidentally destroyed, and they did.
The next day I asked for the same thing and they said it wasn't within thier power.

This same thing has happened across many of my interactions with csr's, it leads me to believe that there are varying 'powers' of csr that see to our problems, much like wow.

They way I see it is;

Lowest would be those who simply talk to you and give you direction, or tell you where things are or what something does etc. (Have no real power to affect anything)

Then thre are csr's who can alter minor things like a buggy mob spawn, name change and so on. (Some power, but still only minor things)

After them there are csr's who can spawn items/money into your inventory, or roll you back, or teleport your character from a stuck location 'If you have tried the /stuck command and cannot use Book of binding, or teleport scrolls'.

All of this is only my own speculation of course, but it does explain why some csr's are a godsend and others are almost useless.

[LeonHart]

Originally Posted by Ariwyn

Leonhart of Karak-Azgal also brought up a great point:

Are we expecting too much from our CSR’s? Are we expecting miracles? If Mythic and GOA clearly outlined CSR’s abilities, perhaps the satisfaction level wouldn’t be so low. I, for one, have limited knowledge of what a CSR can and can’t do. On one hand, I may be expecting more than I should, but on the other hand, perhaps they actually aren’t adequately responding to the issues at hand.

I'm famous!

[Grofinks Gud]

I had one CSR who was very helpful when I had a discrepancy between the text for a quest turn in and the red circle. He even told me how to get there and chatted with me while I rode across the zone and turned it in. That is the only time I had a pleasant interaction with a WAR CSR.

The majority of the rest that I've dealt with have had no sense of humor (which I feel is imperative if they're not able to do anything to help) or have taken weeks or months to respond to me.

My most recent dealing with a CSR was a little after 1.2 came out. I logged on an alt to find her running around the IC in her bare feet. I reported the missing boots and later that night got a response. It turns out that they could tell me exactly which boots I had been wearing before the patch but they could not restore them...even though the initial guy I had been talking to told me they could.

A list of what they are able to do beyond collect violation reports would be fantastic. My expectations are based off what could and couldn't be done in other games so I don't consider them unrealistic but knowing exactly what Mythic allows their CSRs to do would make a difference.

[Edix]

It's pretty obvious that CSR's are contracted temps who are payed little working someplace not at Mythic, probably working for EA, and have no clue as to what game they are responding to. ALL of the CSR's I have talked to have no clue about the game and I do not believe they even know what game they are talking to people in. Many are lazy and just wont help you because they dont care.

Until Mythic responds with a list of what will be done - all the time - and what wont be done - all the time it will continue. CSR's need to be trained and actualy play the game.

@ people who dont belive the axiom "The Customer is always right" do not understand bussness at all. That axiom does not suggest customers are inteligent, it suggests that you do not piss off your customers because they pay your bills. If they are upset you dont get paid. It does not suggest you capitulate to all there demands either.

[zetruz]

Ah, it seems wildcards can't be used to get back gold bags anymore. The game now effectively punishes having a bad computer, so I will never get that bag back. Yeah, I'm pretty pissed... why the hell even have the chest system in the game?! It just poses problems!

[Ivanish]

I would also be very interested in the ammount of ticket s sent by people who voted for a certain option. Also the type of ticket, ofcourse. I wonder if people get more positive, or less so, the more they have to do with the CSR's?

I've had some tickets completely ignored, several times. Looking back I realise that all it would take from their behalf was to send the standard message in many cases: "We are aware of this bug and we have people working on it". But the silence is not a good thing.

[Vauhs]

I have never had a CSR fix something that was broken, or help me in anyway except for the other night when Praag would not flip. Course nobody was in zone when they did flip it. Never had deleted characters given back, they can't do that apparently. Never had a CSR fix a buggy quest for me, just said to bug it and delete it and move on, after doin a line of quests to get to that final stage. I have had CSR take intrest in a low lvl toon with a contrivercial name, and stuck me with a name that was random and much much more vulgar. So yea, CSR in war is perty much crap in my book. Very unsatisfied.

These days I don't petition anything cept for when we mass report zones not flip'n. Just don't see any point in it, half the time it takes half hour just to get them on the same page with you about what the problem is in the first place.

[dunehunter]

I've had a couple of CSRs help me out, have a chat with me, ask if there was anything else they could help me with, etc. So on that level I'm ok with them. It's just that I would really love to know exactly what they can and can't do.